Interactive voice response (IVR) systems that provide information and channel calls to service agents in response to the spoken words or touch tone signaling of a telephone caller have been deployed for more than a decade. The traditional call center for handling service calls was based on a private branch exchange (PBX) that included core automatic call distributor (ACD) functions for connecting a caller to one of a plurality of agents. During the 1990s, the advent of the Internet, electronic commerce, and computer telephony integration (CTI) transformed the call center in ways that enabled delivery of caller data to agents, thereby enabling agents to become more efficient and to improve customer service levels. Today, many enterprises use multiple call or contact centers (both terms are used synonymously and interchangeably in the present application) that extend across different geographic regions, with communications taking place through the public switched telephone networks (PSTN) and Internet protocol (IP) enabled networks that support multi-channel (voice, e-mail, text chat, and Web collaboration) customer interaction.
By way of example, U.S. Pat. No. 6,798,877 teaches a system in which a caller utilizes a personal computer (PC) for establishing an Internet connection to an ACD and for permitting a caller to select a particular agent. A system for providing information about a telephone caller to a telephone agent, wherein caller-specific data of the caller is used to generate a web page that displays the identified information to the agent is taught in U.S. Pat. No. 6,871,212. U.S. Pat. No. 6,847,715 discloses a system for operatively integrating an ACD and an IVR unit in which an interaction input from a caller is stored and then transmitted to an appropriate agent workstation. U.S. Pat. No. 6,798,768 teaches multimedia call routing in an IP network. An Internet Protocol Network Telephony (IPNT) call center system wherein calls are routed to remote agents over the Internet in accordance with a set of business rules is described in U.S. Pat. No. 6,879,586.
Additionally, U.S. Pat. No. 6,940,963 teaches a system that allows an IVR system to gain control over an ACD call that has been routed to the IVR over Integrated Services Digital Network (ISDN) facilities employing Q-signaling (QSIG) protocol. The IVR informs the ACD server, such as a PBX or Private Integrated Services Network Exchange (PINX), that a critical transaction is occurring that should not be interrupted by the ACD. QSIG is a well known signaling protocol based upon ISDN Q.931 that is commonly used for signaling between nodes of a Private Integrated Services Network (PISN). Basically, QSIG allows products from different vendors to interwork together. QSIG can be used in multi-vendor PBX networking, attachment of ancillary equipment (e.g., voicemail systems, paging equipment, etc.) to a PBX network, Virtual Private Networks (VPN), broadband private networks, linking Trans-European Trunked Radio (TETRA) areas, and voice over Internet protocol (VoIP) applications.
According to a standard practice in call center systems, the call center agent takes notes of the call session by typing information into a computer, thereby creating an electronic record that may be stored in the ACD system. These notes generally contain special orders, information that the caller requested, and account agreements reached between the agent and the caller. For example, a caller may call to complain about an erroneous service charge to his account and request that the charge be reversed. In another instance, a cellular phone user may request that his service be temporarily disabled for a time period and request a waiver of the service fee during the period of nonuse. In cases such as these, the caller and agent usually arrive at a negotiated oral agreement, the terms of which are typically recorded in the ACD system by entry of the servicing agent's electronic (e.g., typed) notes. In the examples given, when the call is over the caller reasonable expects to receive a credit or fee waiver that will appear in his next billing statement.
The problem is that in many cases miscommunication or misunderstanding occurs between the caller and the agent. In other cases, the agent records or enters mistaken information, such that the agent's notes or user information entered into the ACD system does not reflect what the caller expected or understood. Unfortunately, when the user later calls back to the call center to complain about the mistake or misunderstanding, the notes recorded in the ACD system do not support the caller's recollection of the original agreement. As a result, human errors and misunderstandings that commonly happen during call center sessions can lead to customer dissatisfaction.
One solution to the problem of avoiding errors and misunderstandings between the caller and the agent involves sending an email to the caller after the end of the call session. The email notifies the caller of the content information entered into the ACD system by the agent. The drawback of this approach, however, is that it is not real-time communication. Not only have the agent's notes already been entered into the ACD, but there also is a delay between the time that the email message is transmitted and the time that the caller actually reads the email message. During this delay period, which may be several days or weeks, memories fade and the information content of the email message may differ from what the caller recollects. In the event that the caller disagrees with the information conveyed in the email notification, he must then try to correct the misunderstanding or error, e.g., by sending a reply email message or by placing another call to the call center. In either case, further delay is introduced and the likelihood of obtaining a satisfactory resolution to the matter is diminished.
What is needed is a mechanism that overcomes the drawbacks of the prior art and which permits a caller to acknowledge and confirm negotiated agreements with a call center agent, as reflected in the agent notes that are recorded in the ACD system, in real-time (i.e., during the call).